Tag: I’m A Man

I’ve always liked those Steve Winwood singles released in the mid-sixties by The Spencer Davis Group. This song was the last single by The Spencer Davis Group released to feature Winwood. After this, he would leave them and form Traffic. Steve Winwood has one of the most distinctive voices in rock. You know his voice anywhere.

Steve Winwood and producer Jimmy Miller wrote this song. This is not the same song by Bo Diddley named I’m A Man. After this Jimmy Miller would start producing The Rolling Stones in their five-album stretch that became their foundation. Chicago would later record a version of this song.

This song was released as a non-album single in 1967. I’m A Man peaked at #1 in Canada,  #10 on the Billboard 100, and #9 in the UK. Not only did Steve Winwood leave but his bass-playing brother Muff Winwood left as well.

Some say the song is a  tribute to the African-American musical tradition, especially the blues and the R&B genres. Steve Winwood, the composer, was heavily influenced by the likes of Ray Charles, Muddy Waters, and other black artists who had revolutionized popular music in the 1950s and 1960s.

After this Steve Winwood would go on to Traffic, Blind Faith, and then a huge solo career. The two huge songs of The Spencer Davis Group are Gimme Some Lovin’ and this one. They are hard to beat.

Steve Winwood: “We were kind of experimenting with what is now called world music – it didn’t exist then – but Afro-Caribbean music which we’d been listening to, ‘I’m A Man’ was actually significant because it was the last Spencer Davis Group song before Traffic. So it was a significant transition because we were using these Afro-Caribbean elements in that music and then we went on in Traffic to combine that with many more elements like folk music and jazz and rock to try and combine all these elements.”

Here is a live version…I’ve never seen a bass player use a thumb pick before.

I’m A Man

Well, my pad is very messy
And there’s whiskers on my chin
And I’m all hung up on music
And I always play to win

I ain’t got no time for lovin’
‘Cause my time is all used up
Just to sit around creatin’
All that groovy kind of stuff

But I’m a man, yes I am
And I can’t help
But love you so

But I’m a man, yes I am
And I can’t help
But love you so

I got to keep my image
While suspended from a throne
That looks out upon a kingdom
Full of people all unknown

Who imagine I’m not human
And my heart is made of stone
I never had no problems
And my toilet’s trimmed with chrome

Well, I’m a man, yes I am
And I can’t help
But love you so

But I’m a man, yes I am
And I can’t help
But love you so

I got to keep my image
While suspended from a throne
That looks out upon a kingdom
Full of people all unknown

Who imagine I’m not human
And my heart is made of stone
I never had no problems
And my toilet’s trimmed with chrome

I’m a man, yes I am
And I can’t help
But love you so, no no

I’m a man, yes I am
And I can’t help
But love you so

Yes I’m movin
Yes I’m movin
Don’t you know that I’m movin
Yes I’m movin
Don’t you know that I’m a man
Yes I’m movin
(Don’t you know that I’m a man)

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